Spheres of sanctuary: introduction to special issue

Abstract

ABSTRACT At a time when restrictive immigration policies are high on the political agenda of many states, resistance to such policies is emerging from below. One form of resistance is the provision of sanctuary by civil society and subnational administrations. Sanctuary can be understood as the creation of a safe space for immigrants where they are beyond reach for immigration law enforcement. Research on sanctuary has been proliferating in the last few years. Nevertheless, a common definition and analytical framework are still missing. This article aims to fill this gap. In it, we provide a definition of sanctuary which identifies four key features that all sanctuary initiatives have in common, and that distinguish them from other forms of social and political action. Further, we distinguish between three spheres in which sanctuary can be enacted – the territorial, social and discursive spheres – and develop a typology that identifies the spaces, modes of enactment, and types of actors associated with each sphere. We show how our typology can be used to address both empirical and normative questions that require comparing different types of sanctuary. Our aim is to provide new impulses to the growing research agenda on the contentious politics and practices of sanctuary.